Marshall Broadcasting dispute

[Riverpilot]

This is a bit of a strange one. Handful of stations threatening to go dark at 6:00p.m. today. But most of their owned stations are operated by Nexstar..
Regardless, The Marshall owned and operated stations don't have much leverage unless Nexstar flexes their muscle on it, which I'm not sure they can do.

Only good thing is it's just a Fox station for me, and I can still get it OTA.

 

[sam_gordon]

From Wiki:

On April 3, 2019, the company filed a lawsuit against Nexstar Media Group for breach of contract, alleging that the company used the sale of these stations to minority owners as a ploy to gain favor with the FCC for the associated transactions, but had been engaging in conduct (including withholding retransmission consent fees) intended to "undermine" the company, so that its stations could be repurchased by Nexstar for a lower cost "[with] significantly less regulatory push-back" under the current political climate.[4][1]
On December 3, 2019, Marshall Broadcasting Group filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.[5]

 

[zippyfrog]

Interesting. Out in Rockford, the adjacent DMA to mine, the ABC channel is gone. I always thought that ABC was owned by Mission, not Marshall. But when I go to dishpromise.com, it says it is a Marshall dispute.

 

[Riverpilot]

Interesting. Out in Rockford, the adjacent DMA to mine, the ABC channel is gone. I always thought that ABC was owned by Mission, not Marshall. But when I go to dishpromise.com, it says it is a Marshall dispute.

See, that's where the confusion comes in. Mission owns that station in Rockford it looks like, but Nexstar is still the operator. So it looks like the stations Nexstar operates is involved with this as well.
Looks like about 25 stations have been taken off the air. ABC, FOX, CBS, etc.. dependent on where it is.

 

[sam_gordon]

If Nexstar is simply the operator, why would they have any say in retrans consent? Wouldn't they just supply the equipment and personnel to put the station on the air?

 

[DJ Lon]

...The Marshall owned and operated stations don't have much leverage...

Isn't that what people said about Sunbeam TV and those 3 stations are still off Dish?

 

[tanman]

Here's the list.Funny -if I'm reading dish promises correctly it's saying I lost Fox and NBC while I actually lost ABC(WVNY).No biggie for us despite no OTA reception-there's only 1 show we watch and it's on hiatus.
KLRT-TV - Fox/CW
KASN - CW
KFQX - FOX/CBS
WTVO - FOX/CBS
WTVW - CW
WAWV-TV - ABC
KTVE - NBC/FOX
KODE-TV - ABC
KOLR - CBS
KHMT - FOX
WUTR - ABC/MyNetworkTV
WFXP - FOX
WYOU - CBS
KRBC-TV - NBC
KCIT - FOX
KCPN-LP - MyNetworkTV
KAMC - ABC
KSAN-TV - NBC
KJTL - FOX
KJBO-LP - MyNetworkTV
WVNY - ABC

 

[ChadT41]

ATT sued Nexstar for this sometime last year because Nexstar was using their muscle to gain favor on their owned channels in the contract negotiations with ATt.

 

[ChadT41]

Sorry, it was Sinclair operated stations, not Nexstar. Same concept, however.

 

[david_jr]

It seems like DISH has a lot of takedowns going. That might not be true, but it seems like it. Is this what STELA or STELAR or whatever it’s being called this time envisions? We’ve had no Fox since the Spring. Saw a crawl about it while watching the Saints game today OTA saying to call and tell them to put Fox back on DISH.

 

[Riverpilot]

Interesting that my local channel, KLJB, a fox station, is pretty much stating they took the signal off air... normally the station and Dish, ATT, whomever, play the blame game on who took the signal off air.

Their big speel right now is, you're going to miss the NFL playoffs and Superbowl!

With only 25 channels in play here, I guess we'll see how long this lasts.

 

[fuzzfacefrombboard]

Any updates on this?

 

[Riverpilot]

Any updates on this?

My area is still down. Dish states they're asking for almost double the previous rate.
My local channel is stating they're asking for fair value compensation. They also changed their dispute page which states that "you have options" "consider the attractive offers of Directv or streaming options of Fox Sports Go"

lol.. They don't even list the local cable companies, or suggest OTA. Guess they don't want people to remember you can get local channels free instead of paying for them.... IF you can receive a signal.

 

[sam_gordon]

They don't even list the local cable companies, or suggest OTA. Guess they don't want people to remember you can get local channels free instead of paying for them....

Your logic falls apart because they would get payment from the cable companies. If your theory was right, they'd say 'consider DirecTV or cable'.

 

[Riverpilot]

I would imagine they're thinking if you're on DISH, you'd be apt to want to keep satellite, hence Directv. This area is comprised of a lot of farmers, etc.. so the Directv reference makes sense. Cable companies tend not to go to those areas due to cost of build out. Many only are able to receive sat TV and sat/wireless internet.

Looking at this overall, with ALL the channels in the mix of things, which include ABC, CBS, NBC, fox in areas... it'll be interesting who blinks first.
I personally don't care if my particular channel comes back or not at this point. With Dish getting rid of Sports Chicago, and several RSN, I'm switching providers in the next couple months. Unless Dish somehow brings back all those channels, then... :shrugs:

 

[jackson85]

My area is still down. Dish states they're asking for almost double the previous rate.
My local channel is stating they're asking for fair value compensation. They also changed their dispute page which states that "you have options" "consider the attractive offers of Directv or streaming options of Fox Sports Go"

lol.. They don't even list the local cable companies, or suggest OTA. Guess they don't want people to remember you can get local channels free instead of paying for them.... IF you can receive a signal.

A few months ago, I was almost ready to get an OTA, which would have been free and installed by a Dish Tech. When I looked to see if Dish still did this, I could not see anything about this anywhere on their website. With everyone who had their ABC Local taken off with this dispute, I imagine that too many Dish Customers were asking for or wanting another alternative since they did take it away.

 

[DISH Support]

Hey, jackson85! We absolutely get how much these negotiations impact our members, and would love to check options to see what's available to help make up for the loss of content. If you will reach out to our Chat team here: Request Rejected , they will be able to review your account!

 

[odbrv]

My ABC channel is part of the dispute. So I took it off my primetime and started to record the 4 ABC shows I watch via my single OTA device. When I tried to record 2 shows that were back to back, I got a conflict error message. I selected resolve the conflict and it didn't. After head scratching it finally came to me that I had set recordings to start 2 minutes early and go 3 minutes late. I had to change this to 0 early and 0 late to finally resolve the conflict. If I didn't remember this, I would have had to buy a 2 tuner OTA device.

 

[DJ Lon]

...I had to change this to 0 early and 0 late to finally resolve the conflict. If I didn't remember this, I would have had to buy a 2 tuner OTA device.

FYI 2 tuner devices also suffer from this

 

[Riverpilot]

Dispute is still ongoing. On one hand I'm a bit surprised Marshall, and whichever companies involved in this, haven't blinked yet.

If this goes for a month, then I'll begin to think these stations won't be coming back.